S. R. Faruqi:

It's an entirely new theme, and the implication too is very fine. That person who would not submit to the grief of separation and the harshnesses of solitude-- he deserves to be given the harshest punishment. In this are hidden a number of implications:

(1) It's better not to submit to the harshnesses of separation. Even if the price of this is to burn in fire or drown in the river, that's acceptable. To submit to the difficulty of separation is not acceptable.

(2) The one who has not submitted to the hours of separation is culpable. Thus he is deserving of punishment.

(3) If in exchange for obtaining the joys of union with the beloved in this world, I would receive the punishments of hell in the afterlife, then there's no harm in it.

(4) If the troubles of separation were not endured, then passion was not complete; and if passion was not completed, then the purpose of life was not obtained. And when the purpose of life was not obtained, then whatever punishment it may be necessary to endure is justified.

(5) In this way it's also been proved that in passion, separation is more important than union.

Another aspect of the meaning is it's possible that the first line might not be about the speaker of the verse, but rather about worldly people, or the beloved, or hypocrites. Now the meaning emerges that having been defeated/broken by the shocks and trouble of separation, the lover has said something, or done something, that has caused people (the worldly, the beloved, the hypocrites) to be angry at him and prescribe the penalty of death. On this occasion the lover (the speaker) says, 'It's all right, those people haven't suffered the troubles of separation. What do they know of what happens to a person during such an ordeal? So if they don't understand my defeated condition, and give me the penalty of death, even then I consent to it. If they burn me in fire, or drown me in water, I have no complaint. I consider them worthy of forgiveness.'

Theme, meaning, mood-- in all three respects, this verse is a masterpiece.

FWP:

SETS == SUBJECT?
MOTIFS
NAMES
TERMS == IMPLICATION

The ambiguity of the subject in the first clause of the first line works brilliantly, and shapes the whole verse by opening up two radically opposite lines of interpretation, as SRF notes. And of course, on initially hearing the first line, one can't at all tell who the subject might be, so the resulting uncertainty and suspense would be, under mushairah performance conditions, an additional source of enjoyment.

Obviously, any sort of quick death is nothing compared to the slow death (or death-in-life) of separation. But why those particular two choices, of fire and water? Perhaps because they're opposite extremes, and thus seem to include the whole continuum between them. Or perhaps, more literally, they suggest that the ordeal of separation includes both burning and drowning, in alternation or even together.